Only recently has polling of the entire Muslim World been published in the press. The Arabic languageAl-Jazeera satellite TV network is probably the only source viewed by most decision-makers throughout these nations..

Political Islam is a significant political force in all Muslim-majority countries - it has however a dizzying array of definition problems. Islamic parties in democratic countries like Turkey and (sometimes) Pakistan and Algeria have taken power, but are often moderate. In Morocco for instance, the Islamists recently invited Jews to join the party.

Perceptions of a War on Islam by the United States and government of Israel seemed to be widespread in mid-2003 after the early 2003 invasion of Iraq. Islamic parties generally gained in elections, and a clear majority of Muslims polled in these nations expressed support for Osama bin Laden's campaign to rid the Muslim world of non-Muslim influences. Specifically, for him to "do the right thing". These numbers were up quite substantially from pre-invasion polls.

The Organization of Islamic Conference formed in 1969 is the only regular forum where all of these nations are actively co-operating as Muslim nations. The much smaller Arab League and the OPEC forum are focused on somewhat different issues, but also tend to serve as places where issues between the Muslim and non-Muslim world come up. Russia joined the OIC in mid-2003.